Blogger’s Quilt Festival

Posted on by
2

In 2006 my mom and I took our first beginning quilt class. We both made a sampler quilt (mine is still in a box). She finished up her quilt top, bought fabric for the backing and then gave it to me because I guess she thought I would know how to finish it. Unfortunately, it sat in a box for ahem, a few years until December of 2011, I was preparing to move out of my sewing studio and came across this quilt again. I knew it would be the perfect gift to give my mom, because frankly I figured she had forgotten that she even made it! (She didn’t fall in love with quilting the way I did.) So I sent it to my friend and go to resource for long arm quilting, Danielle, and got it back just in time to finish up the binding before Mother’s Day 2012! In fact, I was so excited I couldn’t even wait to give it to her on Mother’s Day and she took it home early this month. Hopefully I’ll get mine finished up some time this year too (I just have to figure out how to fix a tiny hole in the paper pieced star right in the center of the top!) So far this is the only quilt I’ve finished all the way this year! I’m happy to be able to link it up to the Blogger’s Quilt Festival.

Amy's Creative Side

Happy Stitches,

Anna

Wonky Churn Dash Block {Tutorial}

Posted on by

Since September of 2011, I’ve been the Block of the Month coordinator for the SAMQG. Each month I’ve researched a specific block pattern and made a sample to present at the meeting. This month I specifically wanted to make my favorite block, the Churn Dash, but I wanted it to have some Anna personality, which means WONKY. Long story short, I couldn’t find a tutorial out in blogworld so I decided to create one myself. I didn’t follow  a tutorial to create the block, I actually looked at one already made and used what I knew about assembling the churn dash and making things wonky! So, here it is, the Wonky Churn Dash Block tutorial.

Finished size is 11″ but you can use any size for the background squares which will of course change the size of your block.

Use 1/4″ seam allowance

Materials needed for each block:

1/8 yard white (or other solid) for background (a white charm pack would work great for this too), if you want the block to be bigger you’ll need more than 1/8 yard background fabric

A variety of scraps roughly the size of your background squares (mine are 4″)

Cutting:

Cut the background fabric into (9) 4″ squares

Assembly:

I chose to mark my white squares with a quilting pencil (don’t iron over it) so that I knew which side the patterned fabric would face. It is especially helpful if you need guidance for wonky placement. I only did this for the first block, on my second one it didn’t seem necessary. Here’s a diagram to show you how I marked the lines.

The patterned fabric will roughly line up with the line you drew. You should see your mark “1P” on the bottom right side of the square.

Now flip your square over again, fold the patterned piece back.

Repeat these steps for all your pieces. 

Press your seams and pat yourself on the back for making a wonky churn dash block! (Not repeat this about 11 more times and you’ll have a good number of blocks for a quilt!)

See? That wasn’t so bad was it? If you make a wonky churn dash block or quilt, I’ve love to see it! Please feel free to share it on my Facebook page.

Happy Stitches,

Anna

P.S. If you have ANY questions, please feel free to ask them in the comments, and I’ll reply so that everyone can benefit from the answer.

FREE Block of the Month

Thoroughly Modern Monday {Solids}

Posted on by

In my humble brain, there are two major factors that define modern quilting. This is my personal opinion and what you read on other blogs or websites could be completely different, but the two items that define modern quilting to me are blocks that are just a little bit wonky, AND the use of solid to set off said wonky blocks.

Back in November of 2010 when the San Antonio Modern Quilt Guild was just starting up, 12 of us jumped in with both feet and attended a workshop by Modern Quilting guru, Denyse Schmidt. At the end of the workshop we each had something like 6 blocks that were wonky/crooked/improvisationally pieced and very special to each of us. Over 2011, I continued to create improvisationally pieced blocks and at the beginning of 2012 I put together this top.
Do you notice how even though the blocks are made up of random pieces the solid (in this case, Bella Etchings Slate) sashing ties them all together? There is also a significant amount of solid in each of the blocks. That is the beauty of solid fabrics in a quilt. Here is another example:

This quilt is based on the pattern called Moving Violations from the book, Rule Breaking Quilts (I LOVE that book by the way), the idea is to take 6 fat quarters, cut them at various angles, sew them back together, and intentionally make them wonky (be still my heart)! I chose 6 fat quarters from Anna Maria Horner’s Innocent Crush line and boy are those fabrics busy! It wasn’t until I added in the solids that the pieces started to break up a little and give my eye a place to rest. Plus, the solid inside border really sets off the busyness of the quilt before the busy outside border fabric.

Now here is an example of a quilt where a little solid might have made a big difference:

See how busy the prints are? If I had used a solid instead of the dots, it would be a little more obvious that the flowered blocks are actually three strips together. Or if I had alternated solid strips with printed, the eye would have a place to rest and the pattern would pop out. Even though I like the look of this quilt (and it looks better in person) I think using a solid would have created an entirely different quilt which would have been even more appealing.

Another great feature of using a solid fabric for sashing or to alternate squares in a quilt is that it gives the maker some room to really play with the actual quilting part of the quilt, the stitches that hold the entire piece together.

This easy little nine patch baby quilt just has simple cross hatch straight line quilting done with a walking foot, but I think the white center really makes that quilting pop.

If you’d like some MORE solid inspiration, you may want to check out my Pinterest Solids board.

And for more Modern Quilt inspiration (with LOTS of solid thrown in) visit the Fresh Modern Quilts flickr pool. There are more than 32,000 images and you don’t have to worry about how you look in a bathing suit to visit this pool!

Lastly if you feel like you want to play with some solids, why not grab a beautiful bundle of Bella Solids like the QuiltCon Challenge Fat Quarter bundle? You get a nice rainbow of colors to play with and it’s not a huge investment, but you could create something really fun with it!

So I’d love to hear about how you use solid in your quilts? Please share!

Happy Stitches,

Anna

Thoroughly Modern Monday {QuiltCon Challenge}

Posted on by

Starting today, I’m going to attempt to post something every Monday that features some sort of Modern idea in the sewing and quilting world. I think there is no better place to start than with the National Modern Quilt Guild and QuiltCon.

The Modern Quilt Guild
The National Modern Quilt Guild started in 2009 when a few innovative  women realized there was a thriving online community of modern quilters who had a desire to meet in person. You can read more about the Modern Quilt Guild on their website. Now there are more than 100 chapters of the modern quilt guild all over the world! I’ve been on the board of the San Antonio Modern Quilt Guild since it’s inception in September of 2010 and it’s been an awesome experience. I love to attend the meetings just to be inspired by all the amazing quilts everyone makes but I’ve also made some great friends through this group. (That actually deserves a post all to itself, so I’ll save that for later)

Can you imagine how incredibly excited I was when I found out that not only is the National Modern Quilt Guild planning a HUGE conference in February of 2013, called QuiltCon, BUT it’s going to be LESS than a 2 hour drive away in Austin, TX!!! Yes, I was almost jumping out of my chair, but since I was roughly 8 months pregnant when I found out, my celebration was slightly limited to exclamation points and Facebook posts. A signature of the Modern Quilt Guild is their ability to create amazing challenges that really get our modern creative juices flowing. When the national guild was still pretty young, they had already started issuing quarterly challenges and recruiting some amazing judges and TONS of fabulous prizes and sponsors. Well, the QuiltCon Block Challenge is really no exception to that precedent. In a nutshell, we’ve been challenged to use fabrics representing the colors of the QuiltCon logo to make a quilt block (limit 3 blocks) and send them to  be curated by Elizabeth Hartman (author of The Practical Guide to Patchwork) who will decide which to include in the creation of a quilt that will be displayed and raffled off at QuiltCon.


Here’s the really exciting part, I’ve put together the above bundle of Bella Solids that match the colors in the QuiltCon logo! It’s perfect for this challenge. You can choose fat quarters (18″x22″) or half yard cuts. These are absolutely beautiful colors and even if you don’t want to make a block, I think it never hurts to have some solids in your stash. Oh and by the way, all of these solids plus 27 others (38 in all) are available by the yard on my website.

I can’t wait to get a chance to play around with these beautiful fabrics to create something that represents modern quilting, and in just one little quilt block! The deadline for submitting blocks is August 15 so there is still time to enter but you’d better hurry!

I hope you enjoyed this Thoroughly Modern Monday post. Stay tuned for next week’s post, Solids: Modern with Traditional Roots.

Happy Stitches,

Anna

FREE Fabric Anyone?

Posted on by

UPDATE: As of 04/18/2012 I still have more than 10 panels, so please e-mail me if you’d like one, I’m happy to send it to you for FREE.

Yes, that’s right I said FREE! I’ll send you one of the following panels (your choice of pink or blue) for FREE (US residents only. If you are outside the US and don’t mind helping me cover the cost to mail it, I’ll send you one as well)

All I ask that you do is make a super cute SOMETHING out of it, preferably a quilt, and send me a picture of whatever you make. IF you make a quilt and would like to donate it to a children’s shelter or hospital in your area, that would be totally awesome too! This offer is good while supplies last.

Oh and if you’d like to see if I have any coordinating solid fabrics (which I do) please stop by my NEW online store which is LIVE!

To receive a FREE panel, please e-mail me anna{at}urbanstitches{dot}com with your mailing address.

Happy Stitches!

Anna

Work in Progress Wednesday

Posted on by

Around the 37th week of being pregnant, (March 15th to be exact) I was hit by this “I want to make something NON baby” sort of bug. So I dusted off some fabric I bought for the Sparkle Quilt Along and got started. Here is what I managed to get finished on March 16th.

It was my first real attempt at sewing anything with half square triangles where accuracy mattered. And, if you don’t look too closely you won’t see where I totally cut off the points of the triangles. Oh well, it’s been a learning experience. So now I’m trying to decide how to quilt it. Oh and by the way, this is the smallest version of the pattern, a wall hanging sort of quilt. It only used 4 fat quarters and some white for the sashing.

While trying to figure out how to quilt it, I came across the idea of “organic (read: wavy) lines” using a walking foot. This seemed rather odd to me because I always thought the point of a walking foot was to be able to sew straight lines quickly and accurately. Well, of course I had to try out this idea. Thankfully I had some extra batting left from the piece I cut for the sparkle quilt. I grabbed some fabric and started practicing. I’m pretty proud of the resulting piece:

After quilting the fabric, I decided to make it into a little cover for my Samsung tablet (the black thing sticking out on the left side). And it may just be the pattern on the fabric, but I like that I chose to run the lines going against the printed pattern, I think that makes them stand out better (truthfully, it was a complete accident). Now that I’ve finished practicing, I’m working on piecing the back for the Sparkle quilt and then I’ll get to quilting it! I’m not sure exactly how the wavy lines will work or how I’m going to incorporate them into the quilting but I’m pretty sure that’s the way I’m going to go on it.


The best part about this QAL was the Flickr group because it had a ton of pictures for inspiration, not only for color choices but for ideas for quilting as well. Plus, all the QAL posts are linked in the discussion area so it’s an easy way to reference each post. (Especially since I decided to make this project on my own, a couple months after the QAL was done)

I’ve never been a big fan of wall hangings (my walls aren’t cold, why do they need a quilt?) or even mini quilts, but now that my time is being spent mostly on feedings, or changing diapers, or snuggling baby, or trying to get a few hours of sleep, making smaller projects is becoming very appealing. I’ve even started a pin board just for mini quilt inspiration. (What? You haven’t heard of Pinterest? If you’d like an invitation, just drop me a quick e-mail and I’ll send you an invite.)

I’m linking up here:

WIP Wednesday at Freshly Pieced

Happy Stitches,

Anna

I am still here

Posted on by

I’ve been MIA lately. I have a good excuse.

Granted, this doesn’t explain my silence in February, but that’s in the past now. So my little baby boy arrived on March 17, only 2 weeks ahead of schedule. And he was 8 lbs at delivery! Yeah, I’ve been a little busy since he arrived, and I found out it’s rather difficult to type when one arm is holding a baby and trying to balance a bottle, but luckily he likes to sleep so eventually I’ll figure out a better system for posting. Pretty soon another baby is going to be born, and this one hasn’t been in the works quite as long, only about since December, it’s my NEW fabric webstore! I’m only a couple days away from announcing the launch of the new site. I’m SOOO excited because I feel really selfish keeping all these beautiful fabrics to myself! So please hang in with me, and if you haven’t already, you might want to like my Facebook page so that you can hear about the launch right away.

That’s it for now. I DID work on a quilt top right before LO (little one) decided to arrive, it’s only a wall hanging size, but it was a fun little challenge. I’ll post about that soon.

I’m off to snuggle with tiny toes and tiny feet!

Happy Stitches,

Anna

Scrapalicious 2012

Posted on by

Right around the beginning of this year, several of the blogs I follow started talking about sewing with scraps. It motivated me, a little (everything I do at the moment seems to take a lot of effort), to at least start to sort out some of my scraps and start a new scrappy board on Pinterest to collect all those great ideas in one place until I have the time to make them.

2012 Sew Scraps Along
 First, Jodi over at Pleasant Home hosted an ENTIRE month of scrappy tutorials and inspirational photos during her Sew Scraps Along.

This inspired me to sort out some of my scraps.

I started with a rather overflowing bag (one of many actually) and during some TV show one night I started sorting the scraps by color.

That worked pretty well, until I needed to use the coffee table, at which point all those lovely piles were stuffed into gallon zip lock bags.

And then an awesome friend of mine, Sara, mentioned that she had some large jars left over from a soup swap and asked if I wanted them – well HECK yeah I did! We traded 6 jars for some fabric, yippee! So I stuffed the jars full of those lovely sorted colors of fabric and proceeded to take some more pictures! (Thanks a lot Pinterest.) I’ll share one here and send the rest over to my Flickr page.

Now, the big question is have I actually sewn anything with these lovely scraps all sorted by color? Ahem – not really. I DID pull out some pieces recently to make some scrappy yo yos after the San Antonio Modern Quilt Guild had a meeting with that exact topic. Sadly, my scraps were mostly too small for yo yos but that’s alright, someday I might actually make something (maybe a ticker tape block like this post from Stitched in Color, where I got the original idea for displaying the scraps in jars). Or maybe I’ll just keep looking at the pretty jars.

Scrap Attack Quilt-Along

Also, Rachel from Stitched in Color is hosting a Scrap Attack quilt along on her blog that runs through March! I might actually be able to make something with that sort of timeline (even though the baby is due end of March). Especially now that some of my scraps are sorted out by color.

But best of all, one of my SA Mod Quilt Guild friends, Danielle, plans to host a Scrappy Bee at her house each month for this year! Talk about motivation! (I could read blogs and drool over Pinterest all day but I’m a social quilt, it helps to have friends around to motivate me to sew.) All I have to do is show up, bring a dish to share (yippee FOOD too!) and then get to sewing! The first one she hosted in January was where I really got motivated to start working on those blocks from the Denyse Schmidt workshop. And now I have a lovely finished quilt top!

I mean, what is MORE scrappy than improvisationally pieced blocks made throughout the year? (Not much I’d say) Now it’s time to start on another one (or figure out the backing for this one at least).

I think this year is turning into a very scrapalicious (I love the new word I just made up) year indeed! I hope you’ll have fun hoping over to visit some of the inspiring bloggers who have been sharing their scrappy adventures and maybe you’ll share some of yours here with me!

Happy Stitches,

Anna

Happy Birthday Urban Stitches

Posted on by

Well here I am, like it or not, a new blog about sewing and quilting but with a MODERN slant. And I do mean SLANT because anything wonky or slanted is my specialty.

Improvisation Quilt

In fact, here is what I’m working on right now, it’s made up of the blocks I created at a workshop given by the “mother” of the Modern Quilting movement, Denyse Schmidt and hosted by the San Antonio Modern Quilt Guild back in November of 2010. The sashing is a dark grey called Etchings Slate in the Bella Solids line by Moda.Of course, it’s not done yet, but I have a sewing day on Wednesday with some girlfriends and I hope to get the sashing and borders finished!

There is more to come, I hope you’ll say hi if you like what you read, it’s always fun to find out that people read this stuff I write!

Happy Stitches,

Anna